Another absolutely beautiful day at the Texas Renaissance Festival. The temperature got a little higher than we’d have preferred, but I don’t think it got higher than about 80 degrees. And, true to form, the patrons were here in droves. I believe the count was over 31,000 people!

Sales, however, also true to form, were fairly average. When the park gets that full, the patrons stay in the lanes and the pubs. The stage acts do well . . . the beer and food booths kick butt. But, the crafters, particularly with higher dollar products . . . not so much. So, no butt-kicking here, just a solid day. However, there was butt-sketching!

Jonathan—the god of butt-sketching—has begun a trio of sketches (one for each of us, of course!) of we three girls that have us all feeling like goddesses!

I wrote last week about how much we enjoyed Jonathan’s work. And how much fun this is to have done. We now own three, and we’ve sent numerous people over there to enjoy the fun. Kyle has posted a great photo taken during the sketching of Iris and Rose. And, now, I am actually posting my photo of today’s masterpiece. We are calling this series of three: Triumver-butts. The concept was born last weekend when everyone started seeing how fabulous these are, and Ginger coined the phrase “triumver-butts.” We hadn’t made a specific plan for when, so it was a totally wonderful, serendipitous fluke that Kelly and Ginger both showed up at my booth, at the slow end of the day, just before dark. So, off we went to ask Jonathan to work his magic! Ginger won the toss on who got today’s piece. The second of the three should happen tomorrow!

Somehow, I never managed to snap even one photo of Nicole or Shawn or Jerry this weekend. Somehow. But, that doesn’t mean we didn’t enjoy our visit and cram in a little bit of fun! Thanks, Nicole, for helping to make it a great weekend!

I did, however, happen to have my camera on me, when I looked up and saw this! Janet has talked for a long time about climbing in the rafters to get spinners up and down for Hal’s booth, but I’d never seen it in person, much less caught it on “film.” But, here she is . . . looking as adorable as ever . . . just twenty feet in the air!

We had a great day. The final day of celebration of Kyle’s birthday began with coffee and went quickly to bloody marys. In fact, we had a booth full of folks celebrating with us this morning! Nicole and Shawn, Ian, Darcy, Damaris, Roxy, Bevin, Allison, and at least part of my staff all joined us in either bloody marys, bloody marias (tequila, not vodka), screwdrivers, or tequila sunrises (sans grenadine). I have lots of pretty Girl Glass to wash, but it was worth it!

From a sales standpoint the day was pretty sad—but that did leave us time to do things like get our butts sketched! That sounds insane . . . it’s interesting to write about it, because it absolutely requires explanation. Our friend, Jonathan, a talented artist and potter, is at this show, doing “butt sketches.” Now, at first that sounds lude and obscene, doesn’t it? But, apparently this is a phenomenon that is fairly familiar in night clubs . . . imagine a fun souvenir for a date—yours and his/hers in your dancing jeans? But, Jonathan has brought this art form to faire. So, now . . . imagine your finest noble garb from behind! Or, an off-the-shoulders wench in a hiked up skirt? Or that hunky guy in barbarian leather and fur? Now, you’re starting to get the “picture!” I’ll try to remember to take a photo of the artwork next weekend, ’cause I forgot today. But the end result of having one of these butt sketches done, is an amazing charcoal drawing of what is unmistakeably . . . your backside! Head to toe, with all the details of your hat and your hair . . . fabulous! Kyle and I had one done and we liked it so well, we’ve been dragging people out there and offering to pay the almost ridiculously low price of $10/couple for them if they aren’t thrilled with what they get.

Nicole and I did it. Nicole and Shawn did it. Sharon and Jim did it. Iris and Rose did it!
If Janet wasn’t climbing around in the rafters all day, she’d have probably done it, too! 😉 But, there’s always next weekend!

30 November 2008
The final day of TRF, the last huzzah. And what a day it was. Although the sales were down year-over-year, the attendance and moral were way up. Especially the last few weeks. And the weather was just simply too good to be true for the vast majority of the event. That included the final day. On this final day of TRF, Marita Beth and I strolled out of the shop for a short while visiting with people that we wouldn’t see again for many months and I, skillfully, maneuvered her toward a shop where I intended to buy her a coat if they had any left in her size. They did. It fit. She pranced and danced in it the rest of the day.
This is my wife wearing her new coat
standing next to Randy who was sitting as a stand in for Old Father Christmas.
That’s my mug on the armwing with the logo of my shop East Wind Games on it.
Cheers.

After two hard days at faire, with one still to go, Saturday night saw its share of silliness. One of the more amusing moments for me, was this capture of my husband peeking out from behind an array of feathers. I was trying to learn more about my camera—Clay (in the right half of this photo) was kindly educating me—and Kyle was being cute. Imagine that. 🙂

Other photos I took during the learning process: Ian, visiting us from Colorado this weekend; Clay, my teacher; and Mary, just being adorable Mary.

It’s a chilly weekend, although we didn’t really get the rain that was forecasted for us. It makes for good cloak sales, and a willingness to try on layers of clothing that doesn’t exist when the temperature is in the eighties and nineties.

One more day. Then the pack-out and the countdown to Scotland! And in between—Dickens on the Strand!

I took a break from the shoppe today! My first time out of the booth during the faire day in three weeks. I had intended to walk the areas of the faire I hadn’t seen yet, this year, but instead, I spent a lot of my time at the nearest stage to our booth, watching Wine and Alchemy. Formerly E-Muzeki (with a different mix of members), the amount of enjoyment I got from this show was a surprise to me! Some dancing, some singing, lots of fun instrumentation, and perhaps the highlight—an incredibly talented male dancer! This guy completely commanded my attention when he danced. I was so impressed.

It was another average day for us in sales, although up until the last sale of the day, I was a little worried. The crowd was very light—kept small by the weatherman who had foretold rain that never really came. We felt a few little drops at one point, but anything wetter must have happened somewhere else. But, at least the small crowd allowed me to see a show!

23 November 2008
Clay, a good friend of ours, saw my recent post about wishing for a Nikon D-series camera. So, the man showed up at TRF this weekend sporting a spare Nikon D-70 camera which he loaned me. I am spoiled now, I think. I do love my Canon PowerShot 850IS, but it’s limited. It’s fantastic for travelogues and for slipping in your pocket on the way out the door. But, this fully-featured Nikon D-70 was simply amazing in my hand. I had more fun shooting photos on this day then I have in years…and I have fun taking photos. Clay tells me that the D-70 is outdated and that there is a D-90 (?) on the market that is heads and shoulders better than the D-70. Say it ain’t so!
On a typical faire day, I’ll shoot perhaps 20-30 photos and keep less than half. On this faire day, I shot just under 400 photos and kept 274 of them. Amazing.
This is a mosaic/collage of some of my favourites for the day. It also fits the Mini-Challenge this week of “Mosaic Stories”. Therefore, I present “Faire Story: A Day in the Life of CrazyBobcat at the Texas Renaissance Festival – Part 1.”
Thanks, Clay!
Cheers

22 November 2008
I started the day fairly early and worked for a number of hours on various website commitments (Sherrie, yours is almost done as is yours Damaris) and some basic scripting. I watched The Day the Earth Stood Still, Feast 2: Sloppy Seconds and The Commitments. By the end of three movies, two websites & some scripting, I was ready for a change. I put on my outfit (scholar) and went out into New Market Village. With beer in hand, I made a direct line for the Sea Devil Tavern to meet up with my friends Iris & Rose. I snapped this photo
just before I took this photo of Rose then went out and watched them perform. I spent the remainder of the business day in their company. I sold their swag for them during the shows and relaxed with them in between sets. Thanks girls.

Every weekend at TRF, there is a wonderful element of “homecoming” and “reuniting” with people we don’t get to see very often. Sometimes it’s a much-anticipated, long-planned event such as a visit from Larry and Denise or George and Delaenya. (This week it was Lance and Kimber! Next week it’s Rick and Frank!) Other times, it’s a total-out-of-the-blue visit from someone we weren’t expecting at all. And often, it’s just a fun surprise that we knew was a possibility, but didn’t dare to count on happening—such was the visit this weekend by many of our friends who came to TRF to see the “Antique Rogues Show!” Amber and Steve and Bobby and Paige and Erin, were just such a visit. And not only did we get to see all of them, but Amber has spent heaven knows how many hours adding glitter and bling to her beautiful Courtesan costume. She has done such an amazing job of taking this outfit to the next level, that I just had to take her picture. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that she’s easily one of the most beautiful women I’m lucky enough to call a friend! I took a shot of her with Steve in the booth, but that wasn’t enough. I wanted her in the sunshine. So, here she is, looking like a professional model!

16 November 2008
I have the very great fortune to be friends with these two lovely ladies.
At faire, they are known as Iris & Rose – Wild & Thorny. They are singers of bawdy ballads and naughty ditties and are, truthfully, one of the most entertaining acts you will find at the Texas Renaissance Festival. If you find yourself at TRF, Scarborough Renaissance Festival or the Colorado Renaissance Faire, please treat yourself to one of their shows and tell them I sent you. 🙂
Cheers.

9 November 2008
I woke up a bit puny on this Sunday morning, and descended the hill into awfullness fairly rapidly. By 2pm, I had lost most of my voice and was experiencing a wide array of symptoms; each symptom pointing to a different illness or calamity. I went upstairs and went to bed letting the rest of the weekend pass me by.
When I arrived in our faire bedroom, I was struck by the beauty of the dappled sunlight on the curtains.
In no way did it prevent me from sleeping. I’m better now.
Cheers.